Green’s Dictionary of Slang

a film, or story, whose main effect is to reduce its audience to tears, usu. consciously romantic; thus three-handkerchief weepie, a very emotional film; also attrib.

1928		Sun. Dispatch (London) 23 Dec. 12/2: There are undoubtedly times when a film calculated to raise buckets of tears has its appeal. Someone recently christened this type of picture [...] a ‘weepie.’.
1948		Sun. Pictorial 18 July 11/4: ‘If Winter Comes’ (Empire) is a re-make of the famous weepie novel.
1955		J. Blake letter 18 June in Joint (1972) 60: The letter I was about to write would have been a weeper, one of those hangdog numbers – you know, not angry, just hurt.
1959		A. Sinclair My Friend Judas (1963) 161: I was reading a weepie to an old dame, and she really began to howl.
1969		N. Cohn Awopbop. (1970) 113: A movie called Ballad In Blue, a backdated weepie.
1970		Times 14 Aug. 10: It could be a pleasant evening in the cinema if it worked simply as a glossy weepy.
1989		Irish Indep. 29 Dec. 22/1: A glut of weepies at the cinema [...] what the trade call ‘women’s pictures,’ ‘tearjerkers’ and ‘sudsers’.
1999		Guardian Guide 15–21 May 81: Hankies out for the big weepie.
2000		Guardian G2 28 Aug. 22: The homoerotic weepie Good Will Hunting.
2012		G. Pelecanos (con. 1972) What It Was 57: What you want me to do, go to some weepy?
2016		Victoria Advocate (TX) 16 Oct. U11/1: No 1 USA Today best-selling romantic weepie.